


Woods

by aneurysmface



Series: Oh, Common Life [5]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M, Sorry Not Sorry, also I'm a dick to Gerard and Kate, head-canon-y for Peter's backstory, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 10:15:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1465648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aneurysmface/pseuds/aneurysmface
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is the story of how Chris has saved Peter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Woods

Peter’s mother died when he was young--just six years old. He watched her go, an arrow through her neck and a scent in the air he never forgets: Gerard Argent. He remembers Gerard looking at him like he was next, but a twelve-year-old Chris had stepped up and put his hand on his father’s crossbow, saying, “He’ll die without her anyway. Let him suffer.”

Peter heard the lie, but Gerard hadn’t and he’d just looked at Peter and said, “Now run along like a good little dog.” He’d fired a round off at Peter’s feet to get him moving.

Talia’s growl when he’d stumbled into the house covered in Maria’s blood and smelling of wolfsbane echoed all the way into town. The only thing that had kept her from going out after Gerard had been her husband’s hand pressed lightly against the subtle curve of her stomach (not Derek, his older brother Anthony who doesn’t survive the fire) and the cry of a two-year-old Laura coming from upstairs, Talia having woken her without meaning to.

The Argents hadn’t been living in Beacon Hills, then. No, they moved in when Peter was 23 and just back from college. Peter can smell Gerard instantly. He can also smell Chris, a smell he only recognizes because the quarry where Chris used to go to think and where Peter used to go to try and push himself too far is on the county line--a mid-way point for two people who the world had chewed up and swallowed.

Peter is out driving around town one day when he’s just turned 22, the sun blazing in the sky, when Laura pulls up next to him at a stop light. Laura hadn’t been quite right since the last group of hunters had gone through town and one had managed to nick her with an arrow dipped in aconite oil. She’s been pulling at her hair because she thinks she can still smell the oil in it. Peter pretends not to see her, doesn’t want to have to acknowledge his niece’s presence today. It’s been seventeen years exactly since his mother died and Laura woke up to the sound of her mother’s pain. Instead, Peter raises his hand and pretends the sun is in his eyes to block his view.

He can remember his mother’s funeral, they’d burned her body on a pyre--her ashes were in the family plot at the back of the Hale property--and he’d cried all night, one arm wrapped around Talia’s leg as she sat next to him while he worked his way toward a restless sleep. Just before Marcus, Talia’s husband, had lit the fire, he’d leaned forward and kissed Maria’s forehead.

Peter remembers the day the Argents move to Beacon Hills vividly. It’s about a week after the anniversary of his mother’s death and the moving trucks look suspiciously like armored cars. Peter knows that they probably are, heavily guarded because they’re full of guns and other assorted weaponry. He sees Gerard yelling at Chris about something and growls low in his throat, his canines elongating slightly, before he turns to go bring the news to Talia.

He goes to his mother’s grave late that night, after everybody is asleep. He likes to go out and just talk with her sometimes, tell her about all his problems. She may have left him with Talia as a kid, but she’d come back after a few years. She’d come back and nobody deserved to have their mother ripped away from them so soon after getting her back. Peter went to her grave to pretend that she hadn’t really left again.

He _roars_ when he sees the sprig of wolfsbane laying on top of her headstone, pinning down a piece of paper. He stalks over and throws it away, the sting of it on his hand not even registering. The note is short, written in a curly cursive that is neat and precise. It reads:

_Hi Maria, dear. So sorry I missed out on the fun all those years ago. Dad made it a bit too quick. It’s a shame, really. He told me all about how much of a whore you were, stupid enough to get pregnant before you graduated high school. I bet you would have begged prettily for me to stop._

_Give your dad our best._

_Love, Kate Argent._

Peter’s vision flashes red, but his eyes flash gold. He doesn’t know he’s moving until he’s already standing outside the house the Argents just moved into. It’s early October and they’ve tastefully scattered pumpkins across their front porch and down their walkway so their house looks like it belongs on the cover of _Better Homes and Gardens_. It isn’t fair that a family that is so cruel gets to have something so nice. Peter smashes each and every pumpkin.

He expects retribution, expects the Argents to come knocking the next day, but instead he finds a note pinned to the tree near the quarry that tells him it’s been taken care of. That someone understands why he did it. Peter tears it up and throws it into the wind, screaming himself raw with anger.

>->->\------------>

Peter has told all of this to Chris, wanted Chris to understand why he’d hated Kate so much. He’d been afraid that Chris would think the reason for his hatred was just a blanket hatred for hunters. He wanted to Chris to know that it was personal when it came to Kate.

Chris, for his part, just nods and says, “I know”.

And he does, because Chris has always been the sensible one of the family, aside from Allison. Victoria had been on the cold side, Gerard and Kate had run too hot. Chris kept a level head most of the time. He knew that his family had done a lot of awful things, that he had helped them do some of those awful things.

>->->\------------>

Peter looks up at him one night when they’re wrapped around each other so neither knows where one begins and the other ends. He looks up at Chris and just says, “Thank you.”

Chris smirks and asks, “What for?”

“That night when you saved my life.”

Chris presses a kiss to Peter’s hair, “You might need to be a bit more specific.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

**Author's Note:**

> [Woods](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvWgXaSZIsA) by Fireworks.


End file.
